Mummy guilt: 5 Ways to avoid the self blame game by Camilla Miller
Parenting was a struggle for me. Just getting my children off to school in the morning and to sleep at night was a battle. I was stuck on parenting ‘autopilot,’ going through the motions and dragged down by guilt and overwhelmed.
I felt trapped, I was not enjoying parenting and was not learning better skills to transform my family life. I started by reminding myself that I was doing the best I can and recognised and acknowledged that I can’t do it all.
Here’s are the 5 realisations I had to finally let go of what I call “Mummy Guilt”.
We are all doing the best we can with the information we have at the time.
We have our kids’ best intentions to heart, we do the best we can with the knowledge we have. It is only on reflection, we know we do what we thought was right at that time.
But here’s the thing, we don’t tend to question the tools we use in raising our kids until things start to go wrong. Rather than feel guilty that things are not going to plan. We need to find other ways to handle situations.
We know what we don’t want, I knew I didn’t want to be shouting at my kids, but at the time, I didn’t know what else I could do to get them to listen. So I found myself going to bed feeling full of mummy guilt. When I armed myself with new knowledge, I finally ditched the shouting and gained willing cooperation without the mummy guilt.
Knowledge is power!
We all make mistakes
Feeling guilty won’t change one simple fact: We are but human, we are going to make mistakes. And so are our children.
No one is perfect, when we hold ourselves to a too higher standard we can only fail.
Let’s look at mistakes as a good thing, They show us where we can grow and develop better coping skills. Guilt is a good thing if we use it for the catalyst to change.
A quick tip! Think about what YOU can do differently next time?
The good thing about parenting is that there is always another day to practice.
We underestimate ourselves
Lets’ be honest. How quick are we to point out our own shortcomings?
The growing laundry pile, the untidy house, losing it and shouting at the kids for being kids and watching too much T.V?
We focus on the negative points, rather than the 101 positive, mundane things we do that are necessary to keep our life’s in balance and order every single day.
A quick tip! Write a list of everything you do every day and make an effort to celebrate your accomplishments.
Stop comparing yourself to other mums
We feel guilty that our child is not as ‘well-behaved’, as clever or sporty as another child or that we don’t have it all as “together” as other mums.
Often we forget to remind ourselves that we don’t know what goes on behind other people’s closed doors. We compare ourselves to other mums when we only see a snippet of their day.
The truth is we never know what they are dealing with. We think that the grass is greener on the other side, when in reality it rarely is.
5. Your child loves you to the moon and back.
We make mistakes and even blame ourselves and feel guilty that we are just not good enough, that we aren’t cut out for this parenting lark! It’s just too darn hard!!! but our kids continue to love us unconditionally. Even when they are upset, I assure you that they don’t love you any less.
Want to find new ways to handle everyday family situations and feel less tired and overwhelmed?
Hi! I’m Camilla, I support mums and dads whose kids are starting to rule the roost, communication has broken down and they feel guilty and overwhelmed. I help them learn powerful communication skills that creates willing cooperation without coercion so that the whole family can go from chaos to calm.
